The subject matter of this invention relates to locksmith's tools and refers more particularly to a picking tool for cylinder locks of the type wherein the front end portion of a cylinder is rotatable within a casing and cooperates with the casing to define an annular keyway in which a tubular key is receivable, the key having a series of recesses on its front end that cooperates with spring biased tumblers in the lock which move parallel to the lock axis.
Tubular key cylinder locks are frequently used to gain access to coin boxes of vending machines, on switches that control electrical circuits of automobile burglar alarms systems, on coin boxes of gambling instruments, plus numerous other types of equipment. The tubular key that is accepted by the lock of this type is not as readily duplicated as a more conventional flat key intended for a cylinder lock having a slot-like key receiving aperture. Tubular key locks also have the further advantage that they cannot be picked by means of conventional picking tools. Upon occasion, however, there are legitimate reasons for having a tubular key type of lock picked by a locksmith. There have been known and patented picking devices for the tubular type of lock. However, such picking devices are not significantly efficient, and generally, even the most skilled locksmith will take a substantial period of time in order to open a tubular type of lock with such a device.
Previously, such picking devices have been designed to fit only one particular type of cylinder lock. In actual practice, there are several different sizes of cylinder locks with center pin sequences, offset left and offset right pin sequences. Therefore, the picking tools of the prior art are not adaptable to the non-conventional size of tubular cylinder lock, or the offset pin sequences.
Almost all tubular cylinder locks at the present time, include seven (7) in number of tumblers. However, there is currently being manufactured a tubular cylinder lock which includes eight (8) in number of tumblers. Known picking devices cannot, in any way, pick such a lock.